Pakistan rejects US report on Afghan Taliban

Islamabad, July 21 (IANS) Pakistan has rejected parts of a recent US report, which said that “Pakistan did not take substantial action against the Afghan Taliban or Haqqani, or substantially limit their ability to threaten US interests in Afghanistan.”

The US state department’s “Country Report on Terrorism 2016” released on Wednesday also claimed that “Pakistan did not take sufficient action against other externally focused groups, such as Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) in 2016, which continued to operate, train, organise, and fundraise in Pakistan.”

The Pakistan foreign ministry on Thursday disputed findings of the report and said the country has taken strong measures to fight terrorism, Xinhua reported.

“We have taken indiscriminate and all out action against terrorists. They are on the run. Most of them have fled to Afghanistan, the country which is in turmoil for the last 40 years, and due to which there are large ungoverned spaces being taken up by the terrorists,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Nafees Zakaria said.

“As is evident from the statistics and media reports available, a considerable number of leaders and senior commanders of the Haqqani network and other terrorists have been killed inside Afghanistan,” the spokesman said during his weekly briefing.

He said Pakistan’s anti-terrorism efforts have been met with success, and acknowledged by a number of countries including the US.

To a question about Pakistan’s role in the context of peace in Afghanistan, he said Pakistan has always whole-heartedly supported all efforts for reconciliation in the war-shattered country.